Current published evidence
| Evidence layer | Current use | Important boundary |
|---|---|---|
| U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics OEWS | National wage percentiles and selected industry medians for software developers (SOC 15-1252). | Wages exclude stock bonuses, nonproduction bonuses, and employer benefit costs; they are not total compensation. |
| CronJobs active job inventory | Dated salary-disclosure counts from employer and source listings. | A listed bound is not an accepted offer, employee earnings record, or representative national salary estimate. |
| Community salary submissions | Not used in the current public benchmark. | Individual records and identity-linked details remain private; no public segment is released before the threshold and validation rules below are met. |
Official wage source
The baseline in the 2026 salary guide comes from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics program and Occupational Outlook Handbook. The occupation is Software Developers, SOC 15-1252, and the current reference period is May 2025.
BLS defines OEWS wages as straight-time gross pay. Its documented exclusions include stock bonuses, nonproduction bonuses, overtime premiums, employer benefit costs, and several one-time allowances. CronJobs labels these figures as wages and never silently converts them into total compensation.
- BLS software developers profile
- BLS OEWS definitions and frequently asked questions
- BLS metropolitan and nonmetropolitan estimates
CronJobs job-listing evidence
CronJobs reports the share of eligible active listings containing at least one source-derived salary bound. The September 1, 2026 snapshot observed 1,418 salary-disclosing jobs among 1,655 eligible U.S. software engineering jobs. This is a disclosure-rate measure only.
The jobs data methodology defines eligibility, freshness, duplicate handling, publication thresholds, and limitations. The dated report and downloadable aggregates preserve the exact observation time.
Community-data privacy and publication gate
No individual community salary submission is published. A future community-derived aggregate must satisfy every rule below before it can be added to the public guide:
- At least 20 validated submissions in the exact published segment after duplicate and quality review.
- A visible observation window, sample size, geography, role/level definition, and compensation definition.
- Median and interquartile range rather than individual values or identifiable extremes.
- Suppression of employer, location, or level cuts that fall below the threshold, even if a broader parent group qualifies.
- No Discord identity, message text, employer-linked narrative, or raw compensation record in public files.
- A methodology-version change when validation, normalization, or segmentation rules materially change.
The present guide contains no community-derived public benchmark because a qualifying, reproducible aggregate has not been published. Private community discussion is not treated as evidence for a public numeric claim.
How measures are labeled
| Label | Definition |
|---|---|
| Base salary | Recurring cash salary before payroll deductions. |
| Wage | The source's wage definition; BLS OEWS inclusions and exclusions apply to official figures. |
| Total compensation | Base salary plus explicitly identified cash bonus and annualized equity. Benefits remain separate unless a source explicitly includes them. |
| Salary disclosure | A job listing contains at least one source-derived salary bound; this is not a compensation outcome. |
| Median | The 50th-percentile boundary in a defined sample, not the arithmetic average. |
Freshness, review, and corrections
Every public table must name its source period and review date. A new calendar year does not make an older source a new measurement. CronJobs advances a page's visible review date only after checking the source, definitions, links, and conclusions under the content freshness policy.
Material corrections change the methodology version or receive a dated note; they are not hidden behind a generic site-wide “last updated” label. Superseded dated CronJobs snapshots remain available so later citations can identify the evidence actually used.
Known limitations
- BLS wage estimates do not isolate software-company levels or total compensation.
- CronJobs listing evidence covers its source registry, not every U.S. opening.
- Posted salary ranges may be broad and do not prove the final accepted offer.
- Company titles and levels are not interchangeable without scope mapping.
- A national figure can hide substantial differences by industry and location.
Citation
Cite the BLS figure to the linked BLS source and identify its May 2025 reference period. Cite CronJobs disclosure evidence as CronJobs U.S. Software Engineering Jobs data snapshot, September 1, 2026, with both the dated report and jobs data methodology. Do not attribute BLS wage estimates to CronJobs or describe the CronJobs disclosure rate as a salary median.